Burme Cadre Jr twists the deal, UN notices deal is worthless

U.N. Says Myanmar Is Forcing
Cyclone Survivors Out of Camps
Associated Press
May 30, 2008 8:02 a.m.
YANGON, Myanmar -- Myanmar's military government is forcing cyclone victims out of refugee camps and "dumping" them near their devastated villages with virtually no aid supplies, the United Nations said Friday.

Eight camps set up earlier by the government for homeless victims in the Irrawaddy delta town of Bogale were "totally empty" as the clear-out continued, Unicef official Teh Tai Ring told a meeting of aid groups.

"The government is moving people unannounced," he said, adding that authorities were "dumping people in the approximate location of the villages, basically with nothing." Camps were also being closed in Labutta, another delta town.

An estimated 2.4 million people remain homeless nearly a month after Cyclone Nargis hit the country May 2-3. The government says the storm killed 78,000 people and left another 56,000 missing.

Centralizing survivors in the centers had made it easier for aid agencies to deliver emergency relief since many villages in the delta can only be reached by boat or over very rough roads.

Aid workers who have reached some of the remote villages say little remains that could sustain the former residents. Houses are destroyed, livestock have perished and food stocks have virtually run out. Medicines are nonexistent.

The Unicef team leader in Myanmar said some of the refugees were "being given rations and then they are forced to move," but others were being denied such aid because they had lost their government identity cards. There was speculation that authorities didn't want "a refugee mentality" to set in, with camp inmates dependent on aid for a long period of time.

Terje Skavdal, a senior U.N. official in Bangkok, Thailand, said he couldn't confirm the camp closures but that any such forced movement was "completely unacceptable." "People need to be assisted in the settlements and satisfactory conditions need to created before they can return to their place of origins," said Mr. Skavdal, head of the U.N. Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs. "Any forced or coerced movement of people is completely unacceptable."

Aid groups say Myanmar's military government is still hindering foreign assistance for victims of the cyclone, while the junta has belittled the aid efforts. Foreign aid workers are still awaiting visas, and the government is taking 48 hours to process requests to enter the Irrawaddy delta, aid groups said Friday. They said the International Red Cross was waiting for permission to send 30 foreign staffers into the delta.

"We urge speedy implementation of all agreements, on access, visas and use of logistical assets," Mr. Skavdal said. "We need to see more relief experts, including (those) from the (International Red Cross), getting into the delta as soon as possible without bureaucratic hindrance."

While he said there have been "promising indications that the government is moving in an overall right direction," Mr. Skavdal added that the real test remains implementation on the ground.

While welcoming millions of dollars from the international community for cyclone relief, Myanmar lashed out at donors for not pledging enough. State-run media condemned donors for pledging only up to $150 million -- a far cry from the $11 billion the junta said it needed.

Copyright © 2008 Associated Press

Sharon Stone mentions Tibet and karma and the Cadre cringes:

What is Dior, Tibet, Stone, Cadre, karma, Sichuan and earthquake all doing in a news item. Torch befuddles the news. The Torch goes to the top of Everest under guard, and the Indian plate jumps 23 feet into the Eurasian plate. No connection. Sure not. Still. The Cadre is spooked.

China embarks on quake diplomacy
Published: May 29 2008 19:41 | Last updated: May 29 2008 19:41
For Sharon Stone, the Sichuan earthquake was karmic retribution. For Wen Jiabao, China’s premier, it was a moment to show the Communist party’s human face. For Japan, it has provided a small, but genuine, opportunity to lay to rest some of the ghosts that still haunt Sino-Japanese relations.

Beijing’s decision to ask Japan’s Air Self Defence Forces to fly relief equipment into Sichuan is rife with symbolism. Not since 1945, when the Japanese withdrew from China after 14 years of brutal expansionism, will a Japanese military aircraft have landed on Chinese soil. China’s seizure of the moment is laudable. So is Japan’s enthusiastic response. Less than two weeks ago the idea had seemed unthinkable. Then, Tokyo sent rescue workers to pick through the rubble of Sichuan. But they flew on commercial aircraft, via Beijing, losing time.

Natural disasters have a way of accelerating existing trends. Earlier this month, Hu Jintao, China’s president, made a remarkable visit to Tokyo in which he praised Japan’s peaceful postwar rise and suggested it could play a bigger international role. The remarks, broadcast live in China, may have come as a shock to many citizens fed a diet of Japan’s wartime barbarities and supposedly continued untrustworthiness.

Mr Hu has correctly gauged that dragging up history to shame China’s most important neighbour is counterproductive. It damages Beijing’s aspiration – evident in its high-level meeting with Taiwan – to be seen as an emerging power willing to join the global order.

The symbolism of Japanese aircraft arriving as saviours rather than aggressors could yet backfire. Internet chatter shows how raw the events of six decades ago still are. “Yesterday their planes were dropping bombs,” says one post. “Today they are giving a little kindness to confuse the Chinese people.” Nor is it certain Beijing’s shift is irreversible. The suspicion remains that, if things get tough domestically, the Communist party may play the anti-Japan card to shore up support.

Yet, rather like the 1995 Kobe earthquake, Sichuan will go down as a turning point. Kobe exposed Japan’s lamentable preparedness. It laid the groundwork for a response to its economic crisis. The Sichuan quake has jolted China just as it was meant to be celebrating its Olympic triumph. It has provided an opportunity to re-evaluate everything from dam construction to the importance of civil society and the role of the Communist party in people’s daily lives. Now it is helping to exorcise wartime ghosts. Some good can come of this tragedy yet.

Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2008

We have to pretend that the Beijing Cadre couldn't order her released tonight. The Torch lifts a brow.

The Burma Cadre Jr works for the Beijing Cadre. Same as Kim Jong Il and the gang in Khartoum, Mugabe in Haarare, and any other lowbrow bully they can collect cheap. The Beijing Cadre has the hygiene of sludge. And is not without shame.

Suu Kyi detention extended
YANGON, May 27 - Myanmar’s military junta extended the house arrest of opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi by another six months on Tuesday, a government source said.

The official, who asked not to be named, said a government officer had gone to the Nobel laureate’s home to read out the extended detention order in person.


Oxford-educated Suu Kyi, 62, has been under house arrest or in prison for more than 12 of the last 18 years.

The widely-expected move is likely to dismay Western donor nations which have pledged tens of millions of dollars in conditional aid since Cyclone Nargis hit on May 2, leaving up to 2.4 million people destitute.

The military, criticised for its slow response to the disaster which left 134,000 dead and missing, has slowly opened the isolated Southeast Asian nation to foreign aid and workers.

But the generals have also shown no sign of relaxing their iron grip on the country.

Earlier on Tuesday, police arrested 20 youth members of Suu Kyi’s National League for Democracy (NLD) trying to march to her home in the former capital, opposition sources said.

A Reuters reporter saw at least six police trucks, a prison van and a fire engine parked near the NLD headquarters before a ceremony to mark the end of the latest phase of her house arrest.

Suu Kyi’s latest stretch of detention started ”for her own protection” after clashes between her supporters and pro-junta thugs near the town of Depayin on May 30, 2003.

However, her formal house arrest under a state security law did not start until Nov. 27 of that year. It was renewed once for six months, and has since been renewed every year on or around May 27.

The last time Suu Kyi was released, in 2002, she drew huge crowds on a tour of the country, a reminder to the generals of the huge sway the daughter of independence hero Aung San still held over Myanmar’s 57 million people.

The NLD won more than 80 percent of seats in a 1990 election, but was denied power by the military, which has ruled the former Burma since a 1962 coup.

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Burma Cadre Jr relents not in the least: Assuaging the Beijing Cadre in small steps

The United Nations mania for the status quo ante results in a naked disgrace. A captive people can expect no help. Jaw jaw leads nowhere. Note that the visa section of the Burmese embassy in Bangkok burned down in a mysterious fire less that 12 hours after Moon announced a breakthough in Rangoon.

Nervous junta opens door to relief workers
By Amy Kazmin in Bangkok
Published: May 26 2008 23:36 | Last updated: May 26 2008 23:36
Foreign relief workers began filtering into Burma’s devastated Irrawaddy delta on Monday as aid agencies tested the ruling military junta’s contention that it would allow a big international effort to help 2.5m victims of cyclone Nargis.

Unicef, the United Nations children’s agency, said it had received permission over the weekend for six foreign technical experts to work in the delta, which had been off limits to foreign aid workers.


The World Food Programme also had several international staff, including a logistics officer, travelling to the region.

However, a foreign doctor and sanitation specialist working for a British charity who attempted to travel to the delta without permission were turned back 50km outside Rangoon.

Most international aid agencies are seeking official sanction for their foreign staff to visit the delta so they can cross military checkpoints ringing the affected region. “A disorderly mass influx of internationals into the delta will make them very, very nervous,” said Andrew Kirkwood, country director of Save the Children.

Aid agencies are cautiously optimistic that they will finally be able to deploy foreign technical specialists to support overstretched Burmese aid workers, who have been running the relief efforts for the past three weeks.

“Things seem to be progressing,” said John Sparrow of the International Federation of the Red Cross, which has 30 foreign technical experts in Rangoon. “We are hopeful that in the next couple of days we will get some news about what we can do and how we can progress.” Cyclone Nargis and the subsequent tidal sea surge killed an estimated 133,000 people and left a further 2.5m in need of food, clean water, shelter and medical care.

After three weeks of barring foreign aid workers from the delta, Senior General Than Shwe, the Burmese army chief, told Ban Ki-Moon, the UN secretary general, that “genuine” humanitarian workers could join the relief effort.

At a weekend meeting in Rangoon, global governments promised significantly to scale up their support for the aid effort if the generals allowed greater international access to the area.

However, the regime has still refused to permit US, French and British naval vessels carrying large quantities of relief supplies to airlift their life-saving cargo directly to needy survivors in the delta. France said it was “shocked”, but ordered its ship to neighbouring Thailand, where the supplies can be unloaded before being flown to Rangoon.

The UN estimates that about 1m people – 41 per cent of the 2.5m affected – have received some help since the cyclone, but mainly around Rangoon and not in the worst affected, hard-to-reach areas of the Irrawaddy delta.

UN officials say many survivors from the worst affected areas are migrating to the north of the country in search of help.

Dalai Lama: Wolf in Monk's Robe, speaks to the FT re the Cadre's confusion

The Old China Ways are broken and Marxism have failed. The Dalai Lama is not unclear. Non-violence has not worked so far. The new way is confrontation and resistance.


Gloom descends on Tibet’s exiled leader
By James Blitz, Lionel Barber and Lifen Zhang
Published: May 25 2008 19:16 | Last updated: May 25 2008 19:16
The Dalai Lama has long been renowned as an optimistic and beaming figure, one who regularly breaks into infectious laughter in his encounters with the international media. But when he greets the Financial Times on the latest stage of a European tour to drum up support for the Tibetan cause, we find the 72-year old Nobel laureate in a subdued, almost black, mood, about the plight of his 6m people.

As our 45-minute interview progresses – in a hotel next to Nottingham racecourse that must seem a world away from his home in exile in northern India – he reveals an increasing sense of resignation and frustration. He says his commitment to pursuing autonomy for Tibet by peaceful means is losing the support of the younger generation of Tibetans. He says at one stage: “I no longer care whether I’m losing influence or not.”

There then follows a shrug of the shoulders under his crimson robe as we ask him how he feels about the prospects for a homeland he has not seen since 1959. “I really feel helplessness that’s all. I have done my best. For half a century I have remained a homeless man with one goal. Has my moral response to help the Tibetan people failed? OK, so it’s failed. But then I am a Buddhist. Compared to ordinary politicians, my thinking is a little bit different.”

This sense of helplessness is understandable in these difficult days, and yet 2008 ought to have provided him with a golden opportunity to extract real commitments from China on greater autonomy for Tibet. Beijing is determined to hold a successful Olympics this summer – and many Tibetans had thought this would put pressure on the Chinese authorities to make concessions.

Yet the Chinese earthquake, which has claimed at least 60,000 victims, turned China from villain to victim overnight, drying up the international well of sympathy for Tibet. China had attracted a wave of criticism, after riots erupted in Lhasa in March.

The Dalai Lama acknowledges the point. “Of course, initially, people are showing more concern over the victims of this large-scale earthquake.”

But he insists that one of the reasons Tibet is now being eclipsed is that China refuses to allow the outside world into witness the crackdown on human rights.

“The re-education [of monks] is going on. That is quite clear. There are arrests in some areas. That’s why I have always said to the international community and to the Chinese government ‘Please let more people go there and see for themselves what is happening’.”

The Dalai Lama clutches at one strand of hope. In its determination to keep Tibet calm in the run-up to the Olympics, Beijing has agreed to hold talks next month with his representatives about the region’s future. The Dalai Lama is suspicions of Beijing’s motives, of course. “Is this only being done for the Olympics or is to deal with the real situation of Tibet?” he asks. “I do not know.”

Still, he has a range of requests, starting with fair trials for demonstrators arrested in the Lhasa riots. As far as a political settlement is concerned, he insists he is not seeking full independence for Tibet, just “realistic autonomy”. Nor is he demanding autonomy for a far larger swath of territory, encompassing the 4m ethnic Tibetans living elsewhere in China.

However, he insists China must give enhanced rights to Tibetans wherever they live. “What we are seeking is genuine implementation of the rights of the [Tibetan] minorities. They are facing of elimination of their culture and language. We are acting on behalf of all of them.”

Whatever happens at next month’s talks, tensions with the Chinese leadership will remain high. And yet he shows understanding for the conservative line on Tibet of the Chinese president and prime minister.

“I feel sympathy for Hu Jintao and Wen Jiabao,” he says. “They have a country of over 1bn people with a lot of complications. There are still wounds from the Cultural Revolution and then another generation has the wounds of Tiananmen. There is a lot of corruption.

“China is today such a complicated country. The old Chinese tradition is much damaged and Marxism has failed. So it’s a very difficult period. As a result, the Chinese leadership is more cautious. That is realistic and it is understandable.”

However, he will not hide the hurt that he feels at the verbal ferocity with which China assaults him. “If some Chinese officials feel it is appropriate to call me a ‘demon’ or a ‘wolf with a robe’, that’s perfectly all right. But what about the millions of innocent young Chinese? If they really feel the Dalai Lama is a demon, then I feel very sad.”

Interview by James Blitz, Lionel Barber and Lifen Zhang

The Cadre threatens Siberia with cash. The Kremlin broods. The Torch awaits Moscow Games.

The future of Siberia is to become a trading partner to the Chinese markets, and while the Cadre can pretend it is just a customer, the truth is that it must buy Siberia. With that cash, Siberia does not need the Kremlin. Target date 2025, the trade war on the Kolyma.

Russia’s aim in wooing Mr Hu
Published: May 23 2008 19:06 | Last updated: May 23 2008 19:06
On his first foreign excursion since becoming Russian president, Dmitry Medvedev has turned east, to Kazakhstan and China, not west. It is no idle gesture. The choice of destination is clearly intended to underline a new emphasis in Moscow’s international ties. China is becoming a preferred partner, just as relations with the rest of Europe, and America, have cooled.

Yet even loyal Russian analysts are keen to stress that this does not mean a fundamental shift in priorities. Rather, following in the footsteps of Vladimir Putin, his predecessor and mentor, Mr Medvedev is signalling that Russia will be hard-nosed and pragmatic in pursuing multiple partnerships. Like Mr Putin, the new president has gone to Beijing, a large retinue of Russian businessmen in tow.

Both political and trade ties between Russia and China are much improved in recent years. Commerce is flourishing. Two-way trade rose 44 per cent to more than $48bn in 2007, a five-fold increase in the eight years since Mr Putin came to power. They have joined forces in the Shanghai Co-operation Organis- ation, bringing the countries of Central Asia into a security agreement seeking to counterbalance US influence in the region. Beijing and Moscow see themselves as part of a multipolar world: hence their joint condemnation on Friday of US plans for a missile defence shield.

It is a far cry from the bitter relations that prevailed during most of the cold war when, far from being close communist allies, the two regimes were at loggerheads. Today the two sides would like to present their new-found friendship as a fully-fledged strategic partnership. Yet it is more an alliance of convenience that disguises many tensions.

China is now lead partner in the relationship. In spite of the soaring price of oil and gas, Russia’s sales to China grew little more than 12 per cent last year, to $19.67bn, while China’s exports rocketed by almost 80 per cent to $28.48bn, giving China a trade surplus for the first time. Mr Medvedev wants to boost sales of Russian military equipment, aircraft and nuclear technology to redress the balance.

China clearly wants access to the massive mineral resources of Siberia to fuel its economic growth. But Russia has always mistrusted Chinese motives, and is cautious of too much investment, or migration, into its vast and under-populated eastern regions. Promises to build a new oil pipeline have yet to bear fruit, after a decade of negotiations.

Mr Medvedev’s next foreign trip will be to Berlin. Germany is still Moscow’s number one partner for trade and investment. Other western partners – including the US – will have to wait their turn. It is the Kremlin’s way of saying that it does not like to be taken for granted. Yet in the long run, Russia fears China far more than it fears its western neighbours. It has only ever been conquered from the east.

Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2008

The Cadre shakes the hand of the Baby Bear, and the Cheka grins. Somewhere a satlink beeps.

The Torch notes that old enemies make for less old allies, and that the explanation for why the murderous Mao made up to Nixon was that he feared the murderous Kremlin more. Now the turn of the screw. The Asian giants consider their futures, uneasily, and agree to dislike the giant they cannot intimidate, for now.

Medvedev and Hu hit out at US missile plan
By Neil Buckley in Moscow
Published: May 23 2008 19:16 | Last updated: May 23 2008 19:16
On his first foreign trip, Dmitry Medvedev, Russia’s new president, joined Chinese counterpart Hu Jintao in Beijing in condemning US plans for a missile defence shield, warning they could upset strategic stability.

The joint statement seemed to mark a determination by Mr Medvedev to maintain the assertive foreign policy pursued by his predecessor, Vladimir Putin.

EDITOR’S CHOICE
Editorial Comment: Wooing Mr Hu - May-23

Medvedev trip east sends signal to west - May-22

Medvedev finalises his team - May-13

Russia makes its political moves - May-13

Slideshow: Russia’s Victory Day parade - May-09

Putin steals Medvedev’s limelight - May-08

Friday’s statement did not specifically identify the US, though the two countries have criticised Washington’s missile shield plans before. But the wording was stronger this time and the statement came during a visit by Mr Medvedev that had already been seen as a signal to the west that Russia had other partners it could work with.

“Both sides believe that creating a global missile defence system, including deploying such systems in certain regions of the world, or plans for such co-operation, do not help support strategic balance and stability, and harm international efforts to control arms and the non-proliferation process,” the statement said.

Mr Medvedev had travelled to China via the former Soviet republic of Kazakhstan, breaking with tradition by making his first visit as Kremlin leader to the east rather than the west. His two-day visit to Beijing follows a warming in relations between Russia and China during the eight-year presidency of Mr Putin – though the countries remain rivals in important areas.

“By visiting China on his first trip abroad since taking office, [Mr] Medvedev has shown that he attaches a high level of importance to the development of bilateral ties,” Mr Hu said.

Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2008

Cadre 2108. A heart and a stomach. More bamboo please!

The Torch frees the future Cadre, too. Surprising discoveries of the juristic talents of panda bears who make decisions based upon sound, smell and temperature.

Leo Lewis, Chengdu
They are the symbol of Sichuan, they are the pride of Sichuan: locals believe they are the very spirit of Sichuan. And now, like the 5 million other residents of the province left homeless and hungry by the earthquake, the giant pandas share the pain of Sichuan.

Today, distressed, displaced and missing vital tonnage of the food they love most, six of the iconic creatures joined the dreadful exodus from the quake zone: the latest unhappy refugees whom the region can no longer support.

Loaded into trucks, the six pandas were taken to a reserve near the city of Ya’an, some 120 miles away from the worst-hit areas.

Another eight of their kind - possibly badly traumatised by the quake and its aftershocks - made a more glamorous exit from their mountain home. They were shuttled off from Sichuan to Beijing in a special flight. For them awaits the limelight of the August games and the delighted stares of millions of fans.

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“I’m not sure about the mental state of the pandas right now,” said Ye Mingxia of the Beijing Zoo in anticipation of the bears’ arrival in the capital on Saturday, “we will have to observe them carefully after they arrive.”

Famous throughout China, the Wolong breeding centre of Sichuan is home to no fewer than 53 of the rare and endangered giant pandas: visitors travel from around the world to admire them engaged in their two principal pastimes - eating and sleeping.

But since the mighty quake that ripped the region apart on May 12, the much-loved pandas have had extreme difficulty doing either.

The reserve they used to call home sits just 20 miles from the epicentre of the quake that thundered through the surrounding mountains, tearing down lives and livelihoods. More than 50,000 people are dead, thousands of children have been orphaned and China has barely begun rebuilding the shattered province.

Daily trips into the mountains to harvest the bamboo so adored by the pandas have been low on the list of priorities of the few locals that remain in the stricken area. With the reserve now cut off from easy access and usable roads, the bears’ keepers are increasingly worried about the animals’ diet.

Fearing for the wellbeing of Sichuan’s most celebrated quake victims, the Chinese government last week managed to shipped to Wolong an emergency consignment of around 5 tonnes of bamboo and a vast quantity of apples and other feed. But more trips will be tough and without the locally gathered variety of bamboo, the pandas are not happy.

Giant pandas are, even their fondest aficionados admit, notoriously picky eaters. Their absolute favourite breakfast, lunch and dinner is arrow bamboo - and when this bursts into its once-in-a-decade flowering season the black and white bears have been known to starve rather than widen their diet.

And the demands of their stomachs are not small: pandas have digestive systems unsuited to processing bamboo leaves, meaning they have to consume about 12 kilos of the stuff just to extract the nutrition they need.

It remains unclear whether other pandas from Wolong will also be taken elsewhere in coming days. Three other pandas remained missing following the quake, said staff at Wolong, and two were treated for injuries sustained in the violent tremors.

Meanwhile the Burma Cadre Jr. defies reason and the UN and all eyes: and refuses food

The Cadre at Beijing is directly responsible for the intransigence and vacuum in Burma. The original Cadre blocks direct intervention and refuses to permit the French advocacy to take control. The Cadre has no answers and looks for none.

In Ravaged Myanmar, Aid Goes Underground
May 23, 2008
KYAUKTAN, Myanmar -- It has been more than two weeks since Cyclone Nargis lashed this riverside town, blowing away Ma San's house and all her possessions.


The Wall Street Journal
Dozens of children -- some wearing sunblock on their faces -- crowded along a riverbank earlier this week at the Pariyatti monastery to look at a body floating in the river, the refugees' source for water for cooking and washing.
Since then, she and about 100 newly homeless neighbors have camped on the crowded ground floor of a nearby Buddhist monastery. "I lost everything," said 54-year-old Ms. San, as hard rain pounded uprooted tree trunks outside. "And if it were not for the monks, by now I would be dead."

Myanmar's military junta has been criticized world-wide for restricting international aid to the cyclone's victims as it fails to cope with the disaster's fallout itself. But as a visit to Myanmar's storm-ravaged areas shows, an informal network has now sprung into action to try to fill this vacuum -- with Buddhist monks, Internet-savvy activists and pro-democracy students providing shelter, clothing and food to survivors like Ms. San.

The country's isolationist junta, subject to U.S. sanctions since it crushed a pro-democracy movement two decades ago, fears that an uncontrolled influx of Western aid workers might undermine the regime's stranglehold over Myanmar's 53 million people. United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon arrived in Myanmar on Thursday, meeting with Prime Minister Thein Sein in an effort to nudge open channels for foreign aid. (Please see related article.) Yet for now, it is the grass-roots relief effort, fueled by widespread revulsion at the junta's handling of the disaster, that is emerging as a powerful and insidious challenge to the ruling generals.

The impromptu relief work has already greatly enhanced the prestige of Myanmar's Buddhist clergy, which includes some 500,000 monks and remains the only large organized force independent of the regime. Storm-relief efforts have also provided a new rallying point for pro-democracy activists, silenced by last September's bloody crackdown on protests in Myanmar's main city, Yangon.

The volunteers say their motivations for relief work are purely humanitarian. But in a country as tightly controlled as Myanmar, any independent campaign inevitably acquires political overtones. Many of those helping the survivors are openly critical of the regime, circulating photos and compact discs that capture the horror of the tragedy and the frequent absence of government response. They include several young activist-bloggers who circumvent Myanmar's tight restrictions on Web access, venting their fury on antiquated computers in dim Internet cafés around Yangon.

'Obstacles to Aid'

"The people are very angry," said the head of one large Yangon-based aid organization involved in the independent relief operations. "They don't understand why the government is throwing up so many obstacles to aid."

The regime has begun to acknowledge this discontent. "Internal and external saboteur groups are making malicious remarks and slanderous accusations, and driving a wedge among the people," the government's mouthpiece, the New Light of Myanmar, said in a comment published Wednesday. "They did destabilize the nation to a certain degree."

Truckloads of soldiers in full battle gear have appeared on Yangon streets this week, amid rumors that monks may stage a demonstration to coincide with the visit by Mr. Ban, the U.N. chief. Another possible rallying point comes Saturday, when Myanmar's leaders plan the second round of a referendum to approve a constitution that would further entrench their rule over this country, previously known as Burma.


Associated Press
Buddhist monks, doling out tarps near Yangon on Saturday, have stepped in as Myanmar's rulers curb relief efforts.
In power since 1962, Myanmar's military regime, headed by Senior General Than Shwe, is deeply suspicious of the outside world. The country doesn't allow roaming by foreign cellphones and blocks access to Web mail services including Yahoo, Gmail and Hotmail, and to hundreds of sites it deems politically sensitive. Since 2005, the ruling generals have ensconced themselves in a remote new capital city, Naypyitaw. The regime's mantra, repeated daily by state media, is "to oppose those relying on external elements, acting as stooges and holding negative views."

The leadership's initial response after Nargis struck on May 2 was to minimize the extent of the catastrophe. The official count of the dead and missing has since swelled to 134,000, far exceeding the toll of this month's earthquake in neighboring China. The U.N. estimates that some 2.5 million cyclone-displaced Burmese need shelter and food.

Prodded by international criticism, the ruling junta is now allowing relief supplies, including those from the U.S., to be delivered to Yangon's airport. It has also issued some visas to foreign relief experts.

But even those Western aid workers who managed to come to Myanmar are still prohibited from entering the cyclone's epicenter in the Irrawaddy Delta, except on brief helicopter tours that the junta organized for visiting dignitaries. Western reporters have generally been refused journalist visas. Visitors who are discovered to be practicing journalism face deportation or arrest.

Such curbs mean that aid convoys chartered by Buddhist monks and Yangon volunteers are often the only ones reaching those most in need in the delta, a low-lying labyrinth of mangrove swamps, inlets, rice paddies and villages perched on levees.

Monks of Yangon's Chaukhtatgyi Paya monastery, home of a giant reclining Buddha statue, say they returned outraged from one such convoy -- two busloads of food, clothes and medicine -- that trekked to the delta town of Hpayapon.

"The officials only think about themselves and their own families," said the monastery's assistant principal, U Ti Lawka, who says he traveled with the convoy and is now organizing another. "People we have seen have no food, they are under rain with no shelter and no clothes. They have been neglected."

At the military checkpoints that stud all roads to the delta, he said, soldiers were instructed to confiscate cameras that can document the disaster's scope. The monks in the convoy hid their camera, snapping photos of decomposing corpses -- human and bovine -- caught in riverside shrubs. Laminated, the photos have been passed across the monastery and to devotees.

Vendors have also appeared on Yangon streets peddling bootleg compact disks with footage smuggled from the worst-hit parts of the delta. These CDs, sold in defiance of authorities and commanding double the price of counterfeit Hollywood blockbusters, show bloated cadavers and villagers with grotesque wounds who express sullen dismay at being left without assistance.

This contrasts with the tone of reports in state media. Newscasts by the government's TV monopoly focus on generals in wide-brimmed green hats handing out boxes of food to bowing, smiling subjects. Monks, if shown at all, are seen receiving aid rather than distributing it. "Rescue and relief efforts have been nearly completed," the New Light of Myanmar announced earlier this week. "A tremendous national task has been implemented successfully."

Bribes at Checkpoints

Independent relief workers, who say they often have to pay bribes to cross army checkpoints into the delta, accuse Myanmar's military of hoarding a large portion of international aid shipments and reselling some of the rest. At Yangon's markets, shopkeepers sell Singaporean condensed milk and Thai dry noodles that some say came from relief shipments.

A blogger and independent relief activist who identified herself as Htaike Htaike helped deliver eight truckloads of privately gathered aid to the delta town of Bogalay last week. She says she found shops there stocked with U.N.-provided vitamin-rich biscuits selling for 600 kyats, or 55 cents, apiece. "The soldiers sold the biscuits to the shops, and the shops are making money," she said.

The government has issued a statement angrily denying any misappropriation.

Convoy to Bogalay

The convoy that Ms. Htaike shepherded to Bogalay was financed by a $40,000 donation from a private Burmese businesswoman and organized by several fellow bloggers, convoy members say. They operated under the aegis of a Yangon Buddhist abbot, Thidagu Sayadaw, who is seen as an opponent of the regime. It brought medicine, clothes and -- crucially for the delta's many monks -- purple robes for clerics left without them by the cyclone. A second shipment, to another part of the delta, left by hired boat on Tuesday, organizers say.

Some of these aid caravans are funded by foreign aid organizations that don't have Burmese staff and are therefore unable to reach cyclone survivors themselves. Convoys are often put together with almost conspiratorial secrecy, as relief workers fear publicity may bring government retribution and disrupt the flow of supplies. One Yangon businessman ferries food to areas near the city by night to make his effort less visible to authorities.

Many of these independent aid workers return to Yangon distraught by what they've seen in the delta. "The only food people have received from the government there is four stale and rotten potatoes per family," Ms. Htaike said. "How can you live on that?"


That's four more potatoes than the government aid that reached Ms. San and other inhabitants of the Pariyatti monastery in Kyauktan, a town about one hour's drive southeast from Yangon. The cyclone wasn't nearly as lethal here as in the Irrawaddy Delta, where entire towns were flattened by wind and giant storm waves.

Unlike the delta, proclaimed a closed military area after the cyclone, Kyauktan and neighboring villages are relatively accessible to foreigners.

Fishermen Lost at Sea

U Oatama, Pariyatti's deputy abbot, estimates that about 50 people from the neighborhood around the monastery were killed by the storm, most of them fishermen who had been at sea in small wooden boats. But more than 100 locals, including Ms. San, had their homes blown away by the wind, crushed by falling trees or lost to landslides. These survivors have all been offered shelter and food by the monastery, which normally houses 10 monks and faces a popular shrine perched on a nearby island.

Men, women and children sleep without privacy on the floor, under a large papier-mâché white elephant, a revered symbol in Burmese Buddhism. Water for cooking and washing comes from the muddy river that laps in the back of the monastery. With a foreign visitor present earlier this week, dozens of children crowded the shore, holding their noses and staring at a human body that floated up.

Still, refugees say they're grateful, as the other option would be to remain in the mud under near-constant rain, without roofs over their heads. "The monastery is the only place we can depend on," Ms. San said.

Mr. Oatama says refugees were initially fed from the monks' rice stocks. These ran out after three days. "The government gave us nothing, nothing in aid. We feel we are abandoned," he says. A rare moment of government attention came in the form of two men who followed the foreign visitor throughout the neighborhood and, identifying themselves as policemen, instructed him not to come back.

So far, private food donations are keeping the monastery's inhabitants alive. In one such improvised relief mission on a recent afternoon, two Yangon university students drove up to the monastery, offloading clear plastic bags with the survivors' first meal of the day -- two hard-boiled eggs and two small buns per person. As the monks kept the surging crowd at bay, the bags were snapped up by hungry women and children. Some immediately stuffed the bread into their mouths.

"We've eaten nothing since last night," said 42-year-old Win Htay as she clutched her ration close to her chest. "This is the only thing that we get."

Now, Pariyatti's monks say, the government is pressuring them to oust the refugees by the end of this week. The reason: On Saturday, the monastery will serve as a voting station for the second round of Myanmar's constitutional referendum. In the first round, held on May 10 in areas unaffected by the cyclone, the regime says 92.4% of voters supported the plan that would solidify the junta's authority.

"The monks want to help the people, but the government doesn't allow it and wants us to leave the monastery," says Daw Ohmar Kyi, a 63-year-old who sought refuge in Pariyatti after her home was destroyed. "We are trying to think of where we can go if we are expelled from here. So far, there's nowhere else."

Torch 2012: Britain trembles at Torch threat: Liberty is unowned!

This will not be the last of this debate, but it is worthy irony to note that the Torch already intimidates London because it represents a tiny bit more freedom than a land without a constitution can bear.

London 2012 Summer Olympics
May End Global Torch Tour
By AARON O. PATRICK
May 22, 2008 1:02 p.m.
LONDON -- The London summer Olympics in 2012 may end the practice of taking the Olympic torch on a global tour, organizers said Thursday.

A final decision could be a few years away, said Sebastian Coe, head of London's Olympic organizing committee at a press conference Thursday.

BEIJING 2008

Read complete coverage of the Olympics and China's efforts to prepare for the Games, and track the torch's route.
The torch relay has become a particularly delicate decision after China's recent experience. Human rights and Tibetan activists disrupted the torch relay in cities around the world, creating a public relations debacle for China ahead of the Beijing Olympics this summer.

In its bid to host the games in 2012, London proposed taking the famous symbol of the Olympics on a tour of countries whose citizens had won the Nobel Peace Prize, according to Jackie Brock-Doyle, director of communications and public affairs for the London Olympics organizing committee. But London had "never made a decision" to hold the tour and isn't obligated to run the event, Ms. Brock-Doyle said. London's plan will have to be approved by the International Olympic Commission, the Olympics' governing body.

Throughout most of its history, the Olympic torch was carried by runners --usually a cross-section of society -- on a tour around the country hosting the games. It didn't become an international event until the Athens games in 2004.

"We should not forget that traditionally the relay has been inside the country organizing the games," said Denis Oswald, a member of the International Olympic Committee, at the press conference. "It's an exception."

Mr. Oswald gave the city a 9.75 out of 10 for its work preparing for the games so far.

One concern is that Britain's torch tour could become a focus for activists, including protests over the war in Iraq, much like the recent tour for the Beijing Olympics.

Write to Aaron O. Patrick at aaron.patrick@wsj.com

Cadre claims credit for showing up.

The Cadre now aim to claim credit for showing up at Chengdu in the mask of the concerned Wen., Mr. No. 2. Note that the Cadre has now raised the bar on how it must respond to crises. Show up. Note too that the Cadre did not show up at Lhasa back in March. And why not? BEcause the Neo-Red Guards only know about rules of one way power. Force is power. Showing up is now seen as an expression of power. Two emotions for the Cadre. Bully emotion. Pity emotion. Same Cadre, without dreams, with thoughts for the belly and far of each other. This is progress. The Torch had concentrated the Cadre's mind on survival school. On to the Olympics.

Not too that the Torch has exposed the gamesmanship.


Rapid Response to Quake
Enhances Beijing's Image
Volatile Issues Take
Back Seat for Now;
Support From Tibet
By JASON DEAN in Beijing and GORDON FAIRCLOUGH in Shanghai
May 22, 2008
Natural disasters sometimes leave damaged governments among the rubble in their wake. But more than a week after a giant earthquake shook southwestern China, it is increasingly clear that the catastrophe has actually strengthened the leadership in Beijing.


The rapid reaction by China's government to the earthquake, along with media -- much of it state-run -- that has spotlighted the best aspects of that response to a newly unified public, have helped enhance Beijing's image as responsive and effective. The strong world-wide expression of sympathy, meanwhile, has quieted -- at least for now -- criticism of Beijing's policies in Tibet and elsewhere that had threatened to overshadow its hosting of the Summer Olympics in August.

While Chinese leaders clearly would have preferred to avoid such devastation and loss of life, the disaster has presented a political opening for the Chinese government, says Jing Huang, an expert on Chinese politics at Singapore's East Asian Institute. "It provided them with the opportunity to show that they can care for the Chinese people and can handle this kind of crisis."

The human cost from the magnitude-7.9 earthquake in China's Sichuan province -- the country's worst disaster in at least three decades -- continued to grow Wednesday, as the effort to rescue survivors drew toward a painful conclusion. The state-controlled Xinhua news agency reported the recovery of only one more survivor, a woman who had been trapped in a tunnel under a damaged hydropower plant. Hope for more such miracles was all but extinguished as the country passed its ninth day since the quake struck.


Many migrant workers living in Beijing are confronting their worst fears as they return to their home towns near the earthquake's epicenter. WSJ's Mei Fong takes a train with one family on its trip home.
The official death toll hit 41,353 as of midday, with 32,666 still missing, the government said. More than 270,000 people have been injured, including nearly 26,000 who are still being treated.

China faces years of costly rebuilding and relocating many of the roughly five million people left homeless. In one glimpse of how big the challenge will be in some areas, officials announced Wednesday that they will rebuild Beichuan, a town that lost about 70% of its buildings and two-thirds of its 13,000 people, on an entirely new site.

Premier Wen Jiabao announced Wednesday that the government will cut spending on other items by 5% this year to make more funds available for the relief effort. The savings will help finance a 70 billion yuan, or roughly $10 billion, rebuilding fund.

The scope of the devastation has prompted a flood of international sympathy from human-rights groups and others that have been highly critical of Beijing. That has, at a minimum, halted the momentum of foreign censure that had been building since deadly antigovernment riots in Tibet in March and the harsh crackdown that followed.

In a sign of how dramatically the mood toward China has changed, the Tibetan government in exile, which Beijing accuses of fomenting unrest in Tibet, said Wednesday it had instructed its offices world-wide to organize prayer meetings and raise funds for victims of the earthquake. "Tibetans across the world should shun staging demonstrations in front of the Chinese embassies" in the countries where they live, the Tibetan group, based in Dharmsala, India, said on its Web site.


Associated Press
Senior Chinese leaders including President Hu Jintao, fourth left in front row, Premier Wen Jiabao, third left in front row, mourn during a silent tribute in Beijing Monday.
The U.S. Congress adopted a resolution on Monday expressing condolences to the Chinese people for the tragedy and calling on President George W. Bush "to respond to any requests for humanitarian assistance" made by the Chinese government.

Such shifts in attitude will likely prove temporary -- the Tibetan government in exile said its moratorium on protests will last "at least till about the end of May." And opinion within China could still turn against the central government if it falters in the enormous recovery tasks ahead. Furthermore, the unprecedented outpouring of public action in the aftermath of the disaster, while in tune with the government's efforts this time, could set a precedent that Beijing may come to regret, says Mr. Huang, the political analyst.

"People will be inspired to push for more open and more transparent and more responsible government" in the future, he says. "That will have a far-reaching impact."

But overall, the government's response appears likely to give a meaningful, and potentially lasting, boost in support for China's leadership, analysts said. That is a stark contrast to the Bush administration's handling of Hurricane Katrina in 2005, which was widely criticized in the U.S. as slow and ineffective. The resulting public backlash helped send President Bush's approval ratings, already suffering from economic concerns and the war in Iraq, to their current lows.

In China's response last week, the most visible figure was Premier Wen, who has become a populist hero as a result of his actions. While Mr. Bush waited until two days after Katrina made landfall to travel to stricken New Orleans -- and then flew over it without landing -- Mr. Wen arrived in quake-battered Sichuan province within hours after the quake struck on May 12. He spent the next four days traveling from one devastated town to the next, often by helicopter when roads were blocked, comforting the victims and promising more help.


Associated Press
Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao, left, comforts earthquake survivors in Muyu Township, Qingchuan County, southwest China's Sichuan Province.
It took time -- in some cases days -- after the quake before large numbers of rescuers could overcome blocked roads and bad weather to reach some of the hardest hit areas. It wasn't until Tuesday evening that the government declared that rescuers had reached all 1,044 of the villages designated worst-hit in Sichuan. Teams airlifted into towns and cities near the epicenter last Tuesday, the day after the quake, often found themselves overwhelmed by the scale of the devastation and the number of casualties.

But overall, the government's massive relief effort -- involving more than 100,000 troops, paramilitary police, firefighters and others from across China -- has won plaudits from quake survivors and other Chinese citizens. State media has been filled with images of young soldiers and other rescuers at work. Mr. Wen -- whose trip was covered intensively by the Chinese state media -- has been followed by other top leaders, including President Hu Jintao, making much-publicized tours of the disaster zone in the days since.

Blame for any shortcomings has tended to land on local-government officials. In Dujiangyan, a tourist town near the epicenter, three local officials were fired for responding inadequately to the quake, according a government-run newspaper.


Reuters
Soldiers handed out schoolbags at a temporary school in Sichuan Wednesday, as state relief efforts continued.
In the town of Wufu, parents of children killed in a school collapse held a demonstration Monday, saying that poor construction, not the earthquake, was primarily responsible for the deaths of their children. The buildings around the school withstood the temblor and remain standing.

"It's not the central government's fault. It's corrupt local officials," said Bi Kaiwei, standing amid the rubble of the collapsed Fu Xing No. 2 Primary School, where his 13-year-old daughter was killed. "We need to punish these guys." Parents said local reporters came and interviewed them, but didn't report the story.

Beijing has been praised by press-freedom advocates for giving local reporters unprecedented leeway to report on the disaster in the first week. Officials have answered reporters' questions in daily news conferences and the government has been unusually forthcoming with answers on everything from casualty figures to acknowledging difficulties on the ground.

There are some signs Beijing has tightened the reins in recent days. Officials appear to be trying to discourage reporting of events that could cast the government in an unfavorable light.

At least some people are afraid to speak out as a result. One man, picking up the body of a girl from a makeshift morgue near a collapsed middle school in the town of Hanwang, said: "I don't want to say anything. It's like attacking the government. I'll get in trouble."

The economic costs of the earthquake have so far been less severe than initially feared, largely because the worst-hit areas were relatively rural and generally lacked major industry. Li Rongrong, chairman of the state-owned Assets Supervision and Administration Commission, said on Wednesday that the earthquake caused at least 30 billion yuan in losses to the companies under his control -- mainly in power or other infrastructure sectors. That is a relatively small sum given the huge size of China's state-owned companies.

Write to Jason Dean at jason.dean@wsj.com and Gordon Fairclough at gordon.fairclough@wsj.com

more Berlin waffle

The Dalai Lama has turned into a hot potato in Germany’s icy relations with China. The Tibetan leader’s visit to Berlin ignited significant disharmony between German Chancellor Angela Merkel and her foreign minister.
By STEFAN NICOLA
UPI Germany Correspondent
BERLIN, May 21 (UPI) -- The Dalai Lama has turned into a hot potato in Germany's icy relations with China, and the Tibetan Buddhist leader's latest visit to Berlin demonstrated once again how divided the German government is on the issue.

When the Dalai Lama finally appeared on the stage erected for him in front of the Brandenburg Gate in Berlin Monday, some 25,000 people, many of them waving the Tibetan flag, erupted into cheers and applause. The Tibetan spiritual leader is hugely popular in Germany -- he has been to the country roughly 30 times. His stop in Berlin, a city once famous for its own struggle for freedom, marked the end of his five-day tour through Germany, which had included speeches in sold-out venues in the Ruhr area and in Bavaria.

The visit came roughly eight months after German Chancellor Angela Merkel, of the conservatives, received the Dalai Lama in her office in Berlin; the first official meeting between a chancellor and the Dalai Lama caused a severe diplomatic crisis between China and Germany. The countries' bilateral relationship has only recently begun to recover.

Ever since that first meeting, Germany's grand coalition government (made up of Merkel's conservatives and the Social Democratic Party, or SPD) has disagreed over how to deal with the Tibet question, and the Dalai Lama's latest visit again revealed how disunited Berlin is when it comes to dealing with China.

It is an open secret that Germany's SPD Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier disapproved of Merkel's meeting with the Tibetan spiritual leader; he has denied meeting him when he was in Berlin last week. Merkel still is touring Latin America -- a lucky coincidence that is sparing her an awkward decision, observers say.

Chinese diplomats ahead of the visit had warned Berlin not to give the Dalai Lama a platform, and they reacted with furious statements when it surfaced that German Development Minister Heide Wieczorek-Zeul would meet him for an hour Monday in Berlin's posh Adlon Hotel.

Wieczorek-Zeul ignored criticism not only from the Chinese but also from her own party: Steinmeier reportedly was furious over the meeting, one he hadn't been informed about properly.

Merkel backed the meeting, according to her spokesman, who said Monday at his regular news conference: "We do not believe that today's meeting will have a negative impact on the dialogue forming between China and the Dalai Lama's representatives on developments in Tibet and perhaps also in neighboring countries."

Observers have criticized the German government's disunity about the Dalai Lama, arguing it was showing weakness when dealing with China.

"It can't be that one prematurely ducks away, that German policy is to take up a subordinate role, to do what the Chinese government expects and wants," Claudia Roth, the head of the German Green Party, told German news channel n-tv.

The Tibetan spiritual leader is currently in Britain on an 11-day tour, which will be followed by trips to Australia, the United States and France, to call attention to Tibet's struggle.

China has ruled Tibet since it invaded the mountainous region in 1950. The Dalai Lama fled into exile nine years later after a failed uprising against the Chinese. Beijing accuses the Tibetan leader of separatist goals; the Dalai Lama contests he supports autonomy, not independence, for the Buddhist region.

In March, protests in Tibet's capital, Lhasa, turned violent, followed by a brutal police crackdown.

His current stay in London also has been marred by controversy, with British Prime Minister Gordon Brown meeting the Dalai Lama in Lambeth Palace, home of the archbishop of Canterbury, and not in the premier's official 10 Downing St. residence, where Brown's predecessor, Tony Blair, received the Tibetan leader in 1999.

China's growing economic and political importance lures leaders into a "hands off" policy when it comes to Tibet's struggle, critics say.

The Dalai Lama himself seems to be left cold by the quarrel over who will or won't meet him, however.

"Europe's leadership personalities … and the political leadership, like Chancellor Merkel, meet with me, and some leadership personalities feel a bit uncomfortable with that. That's no problem," he told n-tv.

http://www.upi.com/International_Security/Emerging_Threats/Analysis/2008/05/21/analysis_dalai_lama_sparks_row_in_germany/7243/

Laughter? This man is the Anti-Cadre.

Why is this man laughing? The Dalai Clique at Parliament.

TIME WILL TELL: The Dalai Lama, on an 11-day visit to Britain, shared a joke with British Member of Parliament Chris Mullin in Westminster, London, Wednesday.

During his visit, the 72-year-old Dalai Lama said time would tell whether China's attitude had changed, or whether authorities were seeking to avoid bad publicity ahead of the Olympics.

Dalai Clique at the Brandenberg Gate. The Cadre frowns.

Steinmeier is the designated midget to the Cadre bullying, while Merkel and the CDU get to stand up. Germany is confused, too. The Cadre is not China. The Dalai Clique is not China. Tibet is not China. Germany has moments when it may seek to apologize to the sun for absorbing all that ultra violet without paying for it or distributing it fairly to the disadvantaged and dishomed. Steinmeier is the new Germany? Nah. Dalai Clique at the Brandenberg Gate. Now there is irony

German rift over Dalai Lama visit
By Hugh Williamson in Berlin and James Blitz in London
Published: May 20 2008 01:48 | Last updated: May 20 2008 01:48
Splits on key foreign policy issues that have dogged Germany’s uneasy grand coalition government came once again to the fore on Monday – this time over the visit of the Dalai Lama.

Tibet’s spiritual leader on Monday used a rally of thousands of supporters at Berlin’s historic Brandenburg Gate to call for further dialogue with Beijing on “greater autonomy” for the troubled region.

Yet his visit was overshadowed by an ugly slanging match between the Christian Democrats of Angela Merkel, chancellor, and her coalition partner, the Social Democrats, led in cabinet by the foreign minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier.

Mr Steinmeier declined to meet the Dalai Lama during his five-day visit, which ended on Monday, arguing that such a meeting could undermine international efforts to promote sustained contact between China and Tibet. By contrast, several top CDU figures met the spiritual leader.

The CDU accused Mr Steinmeier of “cowardice” due to pressure from China, while the SPD said the CDU was “using the [Tibetan leader’s] visit for their own domestic political ends” of discrediting the foreign minister.

The differences reflect a deeper rift between Ms Merkel and Mr Steinmeier, and their parties, on issues ranging from relations with Russia and Turkey to Germany’s stance on international security concerns.

And the public splits, which analysts say could damage Germany’s efforts to present a unified position on the international stage, are likely to worsen as the country’s next national election, in autumn 2009, draws near.

Ms Merkel and Mr Steinmeier had already crossed swords last September over Tibet, when the chancellor met the Dalai Lama in Berlin on a previous visit. The meeting drew heavy criticism from Beijing, and prompted Mr Steinmeier indirectly to accuse the chancellor of playing at “shop window politics”.

Meanwhile, China has begun to express strong public concern about the Dalai Lama’s visit to the UK this week, saying it is “dismayed” that he will be meeting the prime minister Gordon Brown and opposition leaders. Senior Chinese officials have condemned the impending meetings as “political in nature” and also “unfortunate”.

Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2008

The Cadre goes to what it knows best, thuggery and knuckleheadedness: Because he did what? And the Torch is what??

There is a short lesson here: Trust the Cadre and you are a fool. The Chengdu earthquake is the Cadre's mask. The Cadre learns nothing, thinks nothing, remembers nothing means nothing. Five million homeless? Arrest that professor!

Leading activist detained
By Mure Dickie in Beijing
Published: May 20 2008 18:19 | Last updated: May 20 2008 18:19
Chinese police have detained the academic who last year announced the creation of a democratic opposition party after he criticised Beijing’s handling of the earthquake, according to family members and associates.

Guo Quan, a former university professor in the eastern city of Nanjing, is the latest in a series of high-profile dissidents and human rights activists to be detained or imprisoned in what some analysts see as a crackdown ahead of the Beijing Olympics in August.

Nanjing police detained Mr Guo and seized his computer, according to statements issued on an overseas dissident website in the name of the New Democracy party, whose founding he announced in December 2007.

“The police told me that he had said something online that did not accord with the truth,” Mr Guo’s wife, Li Jing, said. She said it was unclear what comments they were referring to. Nanjing police declined to comment.

Chinese authorities regularly detain online commentators and political activists seen as challenging the ruling Communist party’s power or undermining social stability.

Mr Guo has said he founded the New Democracy party to “oppose the autocratic system of one-party dictatorship” that is the “common root of all China’s social problems”.

Mr Guo had also issued a number of statements in his party's name on topics related to the earthquake that hit China's south-western Sichuan province on May 12.

In the statements, the group – whose actual membership is unclear – pledged support for the government's earthquake relief effort, but criticised the lack of forewarning of the disaster and Beijing's decision to initially decline foreign assistance with rescue work.

Mr Guo's last statement before his detention included a report credited to his party's "Nuclear Power Safety Committee" on the tremor's impact on nuclear facilities in Sichuan, home to China's main atomic weapons research and plutonium production bases.

Beijing has said that all its nuclear facilities in the area are safe and under control, but has given few details.

"It is the unanimous conclusion of party colleagues...that the authorities have carefully retaliated against acting president Guo over his recent comments regarding the Sichuan earthquake relief," a "New Democracy party" statement posted on the boxun.com website said.

A number of other activists and dissidents have been silenced in recent months, including Hu Jia, an outspoken activist on behalf of people suffering from Aids and victims of police abuse, who was jailed for three-and-a-half years for "inciting state subversion".

Mr Guo had previously said his university stripped him of his professorial status and teaching role after he issued an open letter last year calling for multi-party democracy.

China's official Xinhua news agency has said police around the country have been tracking down the sources of "earthquake-related rumours", resulting in the detention of at least four people.

Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2008

The Cadre is bluff, and Taiwan knows it. Ma asserts and the Cadre, paddling to stay above the ruins, squeaks not at all.

What happens next is that Ma will offer assistance to the helpless pitiless giant.

Ma calls on China to give Taiwan space
By Kathrin Hille in Taipei
Published: May 20 2008 06:55 | Last updated: May 20 2008 06:55
Taiwan’s new president has called on China to stop its suppression of the island on the international stage, highlighting the amount of goodwill he expects from Beijing in pursuing warmer ties.

Ma Ying-jeou, who won the island’s presidential election in March on pledges of rapprochement with Taiwan’s politically hostile neighbour, said in his inaugural address on Tuesday: “Taiwan doesn’t just want security and prosperity. It wants dignity.”

EDITOR’S CHOICE
Quake charity bypasses politics - May-19

Economy to guide Taiwan hardliner - May-02

Hardliner won’t strain China-Taiwan ties - Apr-30

Taiwan names hardliner as China policy head - Apr-28

China and Taiwan to open dialogue - Apr-12

Video: Ma Ying-jeou on cross-strait outlook - Apr-08

Since Mr Ma’s landslide victory, a string of meetings between politicians of the Kuomintang, Mr Ma’s party, and Hu Jintao, China’s president, have raised high hopes that the two governments can resume a dialogue suspended since 1998 and start closer economic cooperation.

Although the People’s Republic of China has never ruled Taiwan, it claims sovereignty over it and threatens war should the island formalise its de facto independence.

Chen Shui-bian, Mr Ma’s predecessor, focused on strengthening a separate national identity for Taiwan and challenging Beijing’s policy of isolating the island internationally. That led to a climate of mutual distrust, and initiatives for closer economic links ran aground.

Mr Ma expressed confidence that with pragmatism on both sides, a new era of cooperation could start. Recent remarks by Mr Hu showed “views [that] are very much in line with our own,” he said. But he stressed that Taiwan expects China to use this common ground to cooperate with, rather than fight the island, internationally.

“In the light of our common Chinese heritage, people on both sides should do their utmost to jointly contribute to the international community without engaging in vicious competition and a waste of resources,” Mr Ma said.

For decades, Taiwan and China have competed for diplomatic allies to back up their respective claims of sovereignty over the island. In his inaugural address, Mr Ma said residents of Taiwan and China both belonged to the Chinese people, a definition that is controversial with parts of the Taiwanese public but set to please Beijing.

Analysts said that whether Mr Ma can get China to agree to his proposal of a diplomatic truce and his demand that Beijing grant the island some basic participation in the international community is set to become a key test for whether his approach to rapprochement can succeed.

Mr Ma also spent a great deal of time praising Taiwan’s democracy and the island’s history as an immigrant society in what observers said was likely to become a cornerstone of a more inclusive, less controversial patriotism the incoming government wants to foster.

Mr Chen has often used Taiwanese nationalism to rally support but thus offended both China and more recent immigrants from China who still embrace a Chinese patriotism.

Mr Ma, himself a post-war immigrant to Taiwan, said he would be forever grateful to society for accepting and nurturing him. He also said the Republic of China, the state founded in China in 1911 whose institutions and constitution Taiwan continues to use, had been “reborn on Taiwan”.

Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2008

Torch halted yesterday. The Cadre is divided today. The equation ahead is that pity works, brutality fails, the Cadre shirks.

The Cadre is on the phone with its flacks in New York and Hong Kong. Why does everyone pick on us? Why can't we get respect? The answer is unsaid: Because you represent only your bellies and your fears.


China Sets Mourning Period as Rescues Continue
Quake Death Toll
Now Above 32,000;
Torch Relay Halted
By GORDON FAIRCLOUGH
May 19, 2008; Page A8
YINGXIU, China -- China declared three days of national mourning, starting Monday, as a desperate push for survivors continued near the epicenter of last week's quake and across Sichuan.

In Yingxiu, armies of rescuers struggled with powerful aftershocks, landslides, torrential rains and unforgiving terrain as they battled to save more victims.


A town of 12,000 people wedged into a mountain valley and cut down the middle by a roaring river, Yingxiu was among the settlements closest to the epicenter of the powerful quake, according to government and military officials.

Almost every building in town has been ruined. Much of the city has been reduced to piles of bricks and concrete. Apartment blocks still standing list dangerously. Smashed cars and downed utility cables litter the streets.

As the fight to rescue the living and recover the dead moved forward, China raised the confirmed death toll from the quake to more than 32,000. The government declared that the Olympic Torch Relay would be suspended during the days of mourning, which would be marked by a moment of silence at 2:28 p.m., exactly a week after the quake struck.

Chinese seismologists also raised their estimate of the quake's magnitude to 8.0, from 7.8. The U.S. Geological Survey has rated the quake a 7.9.

Landslides have blocked rivers and streams in at least 21 places, the official Xinhua news agency reported, causing potentially dangerous buildups of water that could pose a flood risk in already devastated areas. On Saturday, the government evacuated 2,000 people when a blocked river began to overflow and flood a village.

But rescuers haven't given up hope. Over the weekend, soldiers opened a road into this town in the mountains of central Sichuan, allowing essential supplies and equipment to start flowing in to rescuers and survivors and providing an escape route for those fleeing the destruction.

Yingxiu, about 60 miles west of Chengdu, is at the center of what is one of the largest disaster-relief operations in Chinese history. Tens of thousands of soldiers, paramilitary police, rescue workers, civilian officials and volunteers have joined the effort.

Firefighters from Qingdao in eastern China worked into the early hours of the morning Sunday, tunneling into the wreckage of a collapsed office building trying to extricate as many as four people believed to be alive nearly a week after the quake trapped them.

At least one of the people, a 44-year-old woman whose legs were pinned, talked to the rescuers and received food and water, said a firefighter involved in the rescue.

But when an aftershock measuring magnitude-6.1 hit and rain from thunderstorms turned into a downpour, making the building even more unstable, the firemen had to suspend the search. They resumed work at dawn.

The woman, Yu Jinhua, was rescued at 8:10 p.m. Sunday, Xinhua reported. She had been buried for 150 hours. Rescuers spent 56 hours trying to get her out, the report said.

Across the city Sunday, rescuers were out in force. Firefighters from Shanghai used saws and jacks to dig into the ruins of the Ying Dian Hotel. Other firefighters used a crane and their bare hands to pull rubble from the ruins of a primary school, permeated with the smell of decaying bodies.

Shang Guoliang, 36 years old, watched from the basketball court in front of the school, a blue surgical mask tied on his face. His son, Shang Qiuyan, 13, a student there, is buried in the wreckage, he said. He and other parents say about 200 children are missing.

"I've almost lost hope," says Mr. Shang. "Even if they survived the collapse, it's now the seventh day."


Reuters
Rescuers continued to look for survivors amid the wreckage around Yingxiu, a town of 12,000 people near the quake's epicenter.
Since rescue teams first arrived by helicopter the day after the quake, thousands of survivors have been evacuated from the town and more than 300 seriously injured people flown out to hospitals.

A member of one People's Armed Police unit that arrived in Yingxiu on Wednesday said debris had sealed off many of the town's roads and that there were bodies everywhere. The policeman said his unit was able to help collect bodies and help people near the surface of collapsed buildings.

But, said this man, it was the arrival of firefighters -- who started getting to the town in large numbers by Thursday -- with special equipment that made it possible for larger-scale and more-sophisticated rescue operations.

The problem of not enough rescue equipment "existed in the early stages of the relief effort," across many quake-affected areas, said Ma Gaihe, an army senior colonel, who is director-general of the army's Operational Logistics Support Bureau.

Bad weather and severely damaged roads to relatively remote settlements have made it difficult to move heavy equipment into some areas. The effort to build the road to Yingxiu highlights the difficulties troops have faced. And it shows that supply lines remain tenuous, under threat from aftershocks, landslides and heavy rains.

On Saturday, soldiers with shovels worked to shore up a road being built to follow a relatively narrow dirt path used by local farmers, far below the paved highway that ran along the side of the mountains to Yingxiu. That road was blocked by landslides.

An excavator cleared a mudslide that blocked the new route -- on which construction began Thursday -- at dusk on Saturday. And troops moved through immediately.

"This is a lifeline," said a People's Liberation Army senior colonel helping oversee rescue efforts in Yingxiu. "Now, we need to get out to the villages," which are deeper into the mountains.

Along the road early Sunday morning, soldiers from an armored unit based in Henan were carrying rations, tents, generators, medicine and other supplies on their backs as they struggled through thick mud, many with their uniform pants rolled up around their knees.

By 10 a.m., vehicles, including ambulances, heavy trucks carrying communications equipment and oil tankers, began to move down the road.

Many people are leaving, flowing out the muddy relief road built by the army to a staging area where they can board a boat for a larger city downstream, Dujiangyan.

But some are opting to stay put. On Sunday, Liu Bangrong, 45, stood on the roof of her collapsed bakery, trying to dig her way inside to get insurance papers, money and food. Her home was also destroyed.

"I want to stay. There's nowhere else to go," says Ms. Liu.

--Ellen Zhu in Yingxiu, China, and Shai Oster in Beijing contributed to this article.

Write to Gordon Fairclough at gordon.fairclough@wsj.com

The Cadre slow to move: where are the tent cities: where is FEMA: where is the heavy equipment?

The Cadre is now revealed as a paper dragon. The Old China seeks pity, while the New China ignores the problem and bangs on at Shanghai and Beijing. Five million people unhoused is a detail. Who is responsible? Apparently no one. The Cadre rules the Cadre. Wen is a face in the crowd. China has no leadership, just the Cadre pretending, like dress up. Chinese patriotism is the lowest expectations. As long as the CAdre is not leading a Cultural Revolution, a Great Leap Forward (mass murder and focused ignorance) then it is acceptable.

China Struggles to Find
Shelter for Quake Victims
Rescuers Find Man Alive a Week After Temblor;
Foreign Medical Teams Head to China
Associated Press
May 20, 2008 7:23 a.m.
CHENGDU, China -- China said Tuesday it was struggling to find shelter for many of the five million people whose homes were destroyed in last week's earthquake. The confirmed death toll rose to more than 40,000, as the region remained jittery over warnings of aftershocks.

Meanwhile, rescuers pulled a 31-year-old man to safety, the second case of someone being found alive a week after the May 12 earthquake struck Sichuan province. Officials say the death toll is expected to surpass 50,000, and millions have been left homeless.


Ma Yuanjiang was saved from the debris of the Yingxiu Bay Hydropower Plant, where he worked as a director, after a 30-hour rescue effort, the official Xinhua News Agency said. Mr. Ma was able to speak and began to eat small amounts of food, colleague Wu Geng told the agency, but his exact condition was unknown.

A miner, Peng Guohua, was in stable condition Tuesday after being trapped for 170 hours before his rescue Monday, Xinhua said.

The confirmed death toll increased to 40,075, said the State Council, China's cabinet. Officials have said the final number killed by the quake is expected to surpass 50,000. In the rescue effort so far, 6,375 survivors were dug out from quake debris, among some 360,159 people relocated to safer areas, the council said.

The government was setting up temporary housing for quake victims unable to find shelter with relatives, but there was a "desperate need for tents" to accommodate them, said Jiang Li, vice minister of civil affairs.

She told reporters in Beijing that nearly 280,000 tents had been shipped to the area and 700,000 more ordered, with factories working triple shifts to meet demand. Another 480,000 quilts and 1.7 million jackets were also sent to quake survivors, Ms. Jiang said.

Five million people lost their homes in the quake, she said. "Despite generous donations, the disaster is so great that victims still face a challenge in finding living accommodations," Ms. Jiang said.

China has said it would accept foreign medical teams as the relief efforts shifted from searching for survivors to caring for the injured and homeless. A growing number of countries responded by dispatching doctors to the quake area.


Associated Press
A Chinese man wears a protective mask as he cycles past collapsed buildings in Hanwang, Sichuan province. China said it is struggling to find shelter for many of the earthquake's victims.
A Russian medical team with a mobile hospital arrived Tuesday in the Sichuan provincial capital of Chengdu, Foreign Ministry spokesman Qin Gang said. A 37-member medical team sent by the Taiwan Red Cross organization also arrived in the disaster zone. Japanese Foreign Minister Masahiko Komura said a 23-member medical team would leave Tuesday for China.

Crews of doctors were also en route from Germany and Italy, Mr. Qin said. "China is willing to work closely" with outside doctors, Mr. Qin told a regular news conference.

Other countries and groups have also offered to send medical teams. "But given the situation, and difficulties in the area, including transportation and telecommunications, it is not possible for us to accept all of the rescue and medical teams to engage in relief work," Mr. Qin said.

Rescue workers resumed the search for bodies on the second day of a three-day national mourning period declared by the Chinese government, an unprecedented gesture to honor the dead. Because of plans to bury bodies quickly, the government said DNA samples will be taken from corpses to help with later identification, Xinhua said. Identified bodies will be cremated, although burial will be allowed where no cremation is possible.

During the mourning period, flags were flying at half-staff and entertainment events have been canceled. The Olympic torch relay has been suspended. Such official mourning periods have previously only been ordered for late national leaders.

Thousands of quake survivors awoke Tuesday after spending a night sleeping in cars and in the open, frightened by government warnings of a potential strong aftershock. The alarm compounded uneasiness in the region, which has been shaken by dozens of aftershocks.

A panda from the famous Wolong Nature Preserve that had been missing since the quake returned safely, but two of the endangered animals were still missing, Xinhua reported. The others were "very likely to be alive," forestry official Xiong Beirong told the agency. "Both pandas were adults and they are more capable to escape from dangers than younger ones," she said. "We hope the two missing pandas are as lucky as their peers." The quake killed five staff members at the reserve and destroyed or damaged all of its 32 panda houses. The local government has sent emergency supplies of bamboo, apples and veterinary medicine for the pandas, along with food and tents for staff.

Oil and gas operations in the quake zone are virtually back to normal, state-owned oil-and-gas giant CNPC said Tuesday.

Meanwhile, China's banking regulators ordered banks to ensure adequate loans and other support for companies and individuals in the area. The state-run China Daily warned Tuesday that citizens should be on guard against Internet scams while donating to quake victims, saying contributions should be made only through official channels. Two people have been arrested in Guangdong province in southern China for setting up a fake donation Web site.

The State Council said donations for disaster relief had reached 10.8 billion yuan ($1.55 billion).

Copyright © 2008 Associated Press

Dalai Clique arrives in UK: Cadre frowny faced: Wen called by PM: "Not at No. 10, yeah?"

As if Wen needs to take a break from watching the recovvery of tens of thousands of bodies from the rats and take a call from Brown. "Hey, No. 2, this is No 1!" The Torch watches Wen grimace. The Dalai Clique sends money home. Meanwhile Brown tells Wen, "I won't meet him at No. 10, cheers!"

UK visit by Dalai Lama irks China
By James Blitz in London and Hugh Williamson in Berlin
Published: May 20 2008 03:00 | Last updated: May 20 2008 03:00
China has begun to express strong concern about the visit to the UK this week by the Dalai Lama, Tibet's -spiritual leader, saying it is "dismayed" that he will be meeting Gordon Brown and opposition leaders.

As the Dalai Lama prepares for a visit to the UK parliament tomorrow followed by a meeting with the prime minister on Friday, senior Chinese officials condemned the impending meetings as "political in nature" and "unfortunate."

The British government has sought to avoid offending Beijing by arranging for Mr Brown to meet the Dalai Lama at Lambeth palace and not at Downing Street. By holding the meeting at the home of the Archbishop of Canterbury, the government is underscoring that it sees the Dalai Lama as a spiritual figure.

The Chinese authorities are irritated, however, that David Cameron, the Conservative leader, is meeting the Dalai Lama tomorrow, when China will still be observing three days of national mourning for the earthquake victims.

"This is particularly unfortunate and further aggravates matters," said a senior Chinese official last night. "People are in grief and cannot understand the timing." The official added that Beijing's ambassador to London would raise her concerns about all these issues with MPs at a private meeting.

Mr Brown was careful to inform Wen Jiabao, the Chinese premier, of his plans to meet the Dalai Lama before making the move public.

The visit by the spiritual leader yesterday to Berlin was overshadowed by a slanging match between the Christian Democrats of Angela Merkel, the chancellor, and her coalition partner, the Social Democrats, led in cabinet by Frank-Walter Steinmeier, the foreign minister .

Mr Steinmeier declined to meet the Dalai Lama during his five-day visit, which ended yesterday, arguing that such a meeting could undermine international efforts to promote sustained contact between China and Tibet. In contrast, several senior CDU figures met the spiritual leader.

The CDU accused Mr Steinmeier of "cowardice" due to pressure from China, while the SPD said the CDU was "using the [Tibetan leader's] visit for their own domestic political ends" of discrediting the foreign -minister.

Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2008

Dalai Lama starts tour in London


Protests are expected during the Dalai Lama's visit
The Dalai Lama is due to arrive in London at the start of a 10-day visit to the UK.
The Tibetan spiritual leader will address Parliament and give evidence on human rights to a parliamentary committee during his trip.
Prime Minister Gordon Brown will not receive him at 10 Downing Street but is due to meet him with the Archbishop of Canterbury at Lambeth Palace on Friday.
Protests at his visit from a variety of interest groups are expected in London.
Demonstrators are expected to target his speech at the Albert Hall on Thursday and his meeting with Mr Brown at the end of the week. Scotland Yard said "appropriate" policing would be in place.
The head of the Tibetan government-in-exile is also due to meet Conservative leader David Cameron, teach in Nottingham and receive an honorary doctorate from London Metropolitan University.
Territorial dispute
The visit, and particularly questions over where and whether he should meet Gordon Brown, has proved controversial.
China and Tibet have long disagreed over the status of Tibet, and China sent troops into the region to enforce a territorial claim in 1950.
The Dalai Lama and the Tibetan government-in-exile have been based in India since fleeing Tibet nine years later.

Supporters of the Dalai Lama will be offended at this apparent downgrading of his political status
Jill McGivering
BBC News

Balancing act of Dalai Lama's visit
Anti-China protests led by Buddhist monks began in the capital Lhasa on 10 March this year and gradually escalated into rioting.
The demonstrations took place after the anniversary of the 1959 uprising and ahead of the Olympic Games in Beijing this summer.
China says at least 19 people were killed by the rioters, but Tibetan exiles say dozens of people were killed by the Chinese security forces as they moved to quell the unrest.
Beijing says the Dalai Lama incited the violence, which he denies and accuses the Chinese government of human rights abuses.
China says Tibet has officially been part of the Chinese nation since the mid-13th Century and so should continue to be ruled by Beijing.
Many Tibetans disagree, pointing out that the Himalayan region was an independent kingdom for many centuries, and that Chinese rule over Tibet has not been constant.